to pull them off. By the time I was finished Jon was sitting down at the other side of me messing around with his shoes. I looked at him expectantly waiting for him to say something. All I got was, "Ready?"
I sighed and nodded and we stood up to go, as we were walking out he reached down for my hand but I pulled away before he could close his fingers on mine. I didn't bother to look back, let him have a taste of his own medicine. We all piled into the van, and Spencer and Kate bickered about some bowling nonsense as he drove us home. I was determined not to say anything to Jon, I knew it was childish, but he started this so he could be the first to explain himself. By the time Spencer pulled up to my house we still hadn't said anything to each other. He opened the door and got out to let Stazi and me out.
"Goodnight you guys, I had a lot of fun," she said and headed straight off to the house.
Jon and I stood staring at each other awkwardly for a minute. Finally I gave up and said, "Well, goodnight."
"Goodnight."
I stood there for a moment longer and as he didn't say anything else, I turned and walked up to my house, then continued right on up to my room, ignoring Stazi relaying the nights events to mom and Natalie who were up late watching a movie. I flopped on the bed sitting on Ryan's feet and fell backwards as he rolled himself out of the way.
"Rough night?"
"I don't want to talk about it."
"Okay. Can I tell you about my night?"
"Sure."
"So I'm sitting here minding my own business when you bring two strangers into my room and make a complete mess out of everything. Who were those people?"
"Oh. That was Kate and Spencer, they're Jon's cousins. Spencer is the one that told me about Jon's dad dying."
"Why were they here?"
"Well, Spencer is just impossible to get rid of. Kate was here because I'm making us both dresses for this wedding we're singing at."
"Well that would explain what you were doing with your prom dress fabric out."
"Yeah, I feel like I'm putting a whole lot of effort into this and I don't even know why."
"You don't want to do it?"
"I don't know. I feel like I'm doing it to get to know Jon and his friends better but then tonight it was just weird with him. It's like he doesn't know how to have an argument. Or he's worried that he's going to scare me away so he's just not saying anything."
"Well what are you...not...fighting about exactly?"
I sighed and felt my face turn red. "Well, I was trying to give him the impression that I wanted to get into his pants and he just totally backed off."
"You little slut."
"What guy doesn't want a girl to get into his pants?"
"Maybe he's gay."
"I don't think so."
"Maybe he's really a girl."
"Um, no I'm pretty sure there's something down there."
"Maybe he can't get it up."
"You know you're really not helping."
"Not helping is my specialty. Maybe he's claimed chastity until his wedding day."
"Do people still do that?"
"I don't know, probably not."
"Ryan you know, it's always so enlightening having these conversations with you. I'm so glad I brought it up."
"Well, you do like the guy right?"
"Yeah I do."
"So go talk to him about what's up. Don't just sit here thinking he's gay or a girl."
"I'm not saying that, you are. It's really late, I don't think I should call him now. I guess I'll wait until after work tomorrow."
"Suit yourself, it's better to not let this kind of thing fester though."
I looked at the clock, it was already after midnight, and I certainly didn't want to go waking up his whole house at this hour. "No, I'll just see him tomorrow."
Chapter 12
I went to bed with the expectation that I would see him tomorrow after work. I worried all day about what I was going to say to him, I imagined all the different scenarios in my head about what he would have to say for himself. But he didn't show up to walk with me. I stood outside the store and waited, but figured it was fruitless after a few minutes and trudged home. Now what?
I realized I hadn't seen Ling in forever so I changed course to her house hoping she would be home, and luckily she was. After her verbal assault of all that